the "a" word...

Abortion.

This is what was preached on this morning at church.  Uhh...such a depressing word. As Jason started stated facts about abortion, I literally got a knot in my throat, & almost grabbed my coat, purse, Bible & Starbucks drink & walked out to go pick up Ryder from the nursery where I had just dropped him off, & go to Target to do some shopping.  I didn't want to be depressed the rest of the day or week, thinking about all the facts he was telling us.  But then I started thinking. I needed to hear these facts & didn't need to just ignore them because they were what was going on in our world today.  This is a REAL thing that is happening every day around us.  Sometimes I think if I just ignore something, then it really isn't a problem & I don't really have to know about it. No big deal.  So...I decided to face it & be a big girl, because THIS.WAS.REAL.

Abortion was legalized in 1973 with the case of Roe vs. Wade (one thing I CAN remember from college).  :P  About 1.5 MILLION abortions take place every year in America.  This is about the same as the casualties of the Revolutionary War, Civil War, WWI, WWII, Vietnam, Korea & Persian Gulf combined.  That seems so OUTRAGEOUS to me. America's definition of a human life is someone with a beating heart & someone with active brain waves.  Well, you know what...babies have a detectable heartbeat around 6 weeks & brain activity shortly there after.  So why isn't an abortion the act of killing or murder?  Something seems awfully messed up with our system...but what's new?

As a mom, it made it even harder for me to sit & listen to Jason's sermon.  I couldn't imagine my life without my little man!  Being someone who didn't get pregnant at just the ideal time or age, being in the middle of college, not being married & just a child myself, abortion could have been an easy out for me.  No one would have known that I had sinned & I could have just stayed in school, gone on to graduate with my starting class & no one would have ever known what I had done.

I knew that abortion was wrong, but being in the situation I was in & dealing with everything I was having to deal with, I would be lying if I said that I didn't think about it.  It just seemed like it would be an easy way out.  As Jason said today, when we sin, we shouldn't try & cover up that sin by committing another act of sin, which is what an abortion would have been.  I am SOO glad that I knew it was wrong & knew that it would be a mistake.  I choose to face the battles ahead of me & do what I knew was right & I am SOO thankful that I did!  :)

We all sin every day, I just happened to sin in a way that would really show for 9 long months, & even after that it would continue to show every day for the rest of my life.  Luckily, not all sins are that way, but what if they were? Would you be out doing some of the things you are doing?  What if you had to wear a beer bottle around your neck every day, every where you went to show that you had been out partying the night before?  Or  what if you had a bottle of prescription pills tied around your neck that you bought off the street last week to get high when you felt down?  What if....?  Just something to think about (little off subject!  :P)

I knew I had to write after walking out of that service today.  I had been there, when I used to tell myself that I would never dare think about getting an abortion!  Luckily, I had been taught that it was wrong, & sadly not all woman are taught the same.  I can't imagine having to live with myself after making a decision like that.  On the outside, it might have seemed like the "easy way out" for me, but on the inside, it would have only made the situation worse.

I am so happy & proud of my decision today & I wouldn't trade all my heartache, hard times, tears & fights for not having my little man asleep in his crib in his bedroom right down the hall.  CANNOT.IMAGINE.

Thank you Jason for being real with us & helping me to not ignore the facts of life today, as sad as they may be.